


Are you still you?

by SteampunkWilson



Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Gen, Lil Bulb original is dead, Post-Episode: s02e24 Moonvasion!, So is Gyro, Sort of headcannon that both of the originals are dead now, enjoy, i don't know what this is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-21
Updated: 2019-09-21
Packaged: 2020-10-25 06:29:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20719634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SteampunkWilson/pseuds/SteampunkWilson
Summary: After the events of Moonvasion and discovering what happened to Lil Bulb, Gyro has been acting weird, and Fenton has a very important question to ask him.





	Are you still you?

Gyro? Are you dead?"

Of all the stupid questions.

Gyro looked up from his latest project.

"Huh? Am I what?"

"Dead." Fenton's voice was shaking along with his hands. "Because I saw you, not the real you obviously, but the clone you get incinerated and... I'm just so confused about stuff and..." Fenton's hands began to fiddle with his tie. "What happened to you? Did you see yourself die? The clone said that you didn't know who was who anymore, but there's only one left and... are you the real Gyro? The original? Are you still you?"

Gyro sighed, and pushed back his chair on its wheels. He turned to face Fenton, and his eyes were filled to the brim with sadness. Fenton didn't think he'd ever seen someone in so much pain, not even on TV. You couldn't fake that.

"I don't know." He whispered. "The clones were all grown as genetic copies, nothing to distinguish us. And Gyro chipped everyone's brain, uploading all of his memories into his clones. There's no way of knowing the difference."

Fenton bit his tongue, biting down hard, hoping the pain would help clear his mind. So many days had passed since Earth and the McDuck family had triumphed over Lunaris, and even he could tell that Gyro hadn't been the same since. He seemed more distant, less... focused. He hadn't begun working on any new inventions, not even the things Mr McDuck asked him to work on, which he would usually begin on straight away in order to get them right as soon as possible.

Though, Fenton supposed, this was to be expected, given what had happened the day of the invasion. When Gyro had proudly sent out his army of children, all of Lil Bulb's own clones, his siblings, all modelled after him with no change in the code, but still they seemed off, less cocky and sure of themselves.

Just like Gyro's clones.

Fenton still remembered that horrible moment.

_ He would always remember it; when the tired, but proud stream of robots had marched back into the lab, heads held high. He had been resting at his desk, preparing to mend the Gizmoduck armour, which had taken some heavy knocks during their time as prisoners of the aliens. Gyro had watched his creations with a proud smile on his face as they stood to attention, resting slightly in his chair. The little robots lined up, one by one, ready to take their orders from their commander._

_Only their commander wasn't there._

_Gyro frowned and stood up, slowly going over to check them all, one by one. They were all standing to attention, all a little knocked about from the fight, but ultimately they seemed ready for whatever Gyro had planned next. But Gyro only wanted one thing._

_"Where is it?!" Gyro demanded, looking around anxiously as if Lil Bulb would suddenly appear. "Where's the original?! Where's Lil Bulb?!"_

_Fenton was on his feet now too, looking around himself. Lil Bulb, the lab's loyal little helper, always messing around with them, always read to help, he couldn't be... there was no way..._

_One of the Bulb clones stepped forwards, and used a small build in projector that Gyro had recently installed to play out the scene that they had all witnessed on their shared network. They saw Lil Bulb, the original, identifiable by the crack on his head. He was caught by the moonlanders, we was trying to get free, he..._

_When Lil Bulb saluted, Gyro gasped, bringing a hand to his mouth, barely muffling a sob as Lil Bulb unscrewed his head, letting it fall to the ground and smash, taking with it all of his key coding and microchips, everything that made him Lil Bulb smashed on the ground below, and the screen cut to static._

_"No." Gyro whispered. "No! It can't be... no! They can't be gone, I made them resilient to all sorts of disaster! There's no way, it's not possible!" Gyro's voice began to rise in volume, causing all the other Lil Bulbs to disperse. Fenton stood where he was, shocked to the core._

_"Gyro." He whispered. "I'm so sorry."_

_Gyro didn't even look at him. He was breathing hard, fists clenched. Suddenly he lunged towards a small framed picture of Lil Bulb that he kept on his desk, grabbed it and hurled in onto the floor in a burst of violent movement._

_"Stupid robot." He whispered, his words seeming choked. "Why did he have to... the aliens probably already knew where they were... he shouldn't be..." Gyro gave an infuriated shriek and headed off towards the elevator. Fenton let him go. He would go after him in a few minutes, but he currently felt it was best for them both to grieve alone. _

Even now, Gyro didn't look the same, still too torn up about Lil Bulb's passing to work on anything. But deep down, Fenton knew there was more to it than that. That somehow, this Gyro might not be the same.

"Couldn't we do a scan?" He asked. Gyro frowned in confusion.

"What?"

"A scan, you know, look for the microchip with all the memories." Fenton knew that this was dangerous ground he was treading on, but he didn't care. After so long of simply observing what was different, he wanted to know the truth.

Gyro frowned again, but it was a different frown, one that Fenton recognised. This was his thinking frown.

"You're right Cabrera!" He said suddenly. "We could scan for it! Quick, there's a scanning device over there by Manny's work station! Grab it and I'll program in the necessary code!" He pointed off to the left, without realising that Manny's work station was to the right of him. With a sinking feeling, Fenton, headed over to the correct device, already regretting his decision to intervene with Gyro's strange existence, and brought it back over to him.

After a few minutes, it was ready.

"Are you ready?" Fenton couldn't help but ask. Probably to mask the fact that he wasn't ready by a long shot.

Gyro raised the scanner and with a deep breath, scanned his own brain.

For a moment, nothing. Then something lit up in red, in the left corner of the X-Ray, something bright and silver in colour, something that didn't belong in a brain.

A microchip.

Gyro cried out, dropping the X-Ray, and made a starving clutch towards his own brain, as if he could rip the memory chip out with his bare hands, taking the truth away from him.

Fenton just stood where he was, shocked and shaken. Lil Bulb was gone. So was Gyro. Two of his best scientist friends, Lil Bulb and his constant teasing and helpfulness, Gyro and his snarky attitude, but subtle approval whenever Fenton managed to get something working that Gyro hadn't expected. Both of them were gone. Forever. Clones could be made, new robots could be built, but they wouldn't be the same, how could they ever be the same, without the same experiances and trials that the originals had faced?

Fenton thought back to the invasion when Gyro had suggested using him as a decoy for the aliens. Had that even been the real Gyro? His mother had been sitting right there next to him. Even if she hadn't known he was Gizmoduck, Gyro should have known that she was incredibly protective of the city's hero since the Beaks incident. Maybe the original Gyro had been long gone by that time and he hadn't even noticed!

Clone Gyro sat up from where he had slumped in his chair, distraught to know the original was dead. Fenton glanced over at him, and a small picture that Gyro had kept on his desk caught his eye. It was from the latest McDuck Enterprises community retreat to someplace in the Alps, Fenton hadn't been able to attend on account of visiting some reletives in Cuba with his Ma'ma. He hadn't thought Gyro would attend, but indeed, there he was in the picture, Lil Bulb on his shoulder, both of them waring little knitted scarves and looking overwhelmed with all the picturesque snow and mountains. But they looked happy together, Lil Bulb resting his head on the top of Gyro's as they faced towards something off camera. If Fenton squinted, he could even see a figure behind them in the distance, cane in hand, fighting a yeti. Suddenly, he was quite saddened to have missed the trip and the oppertunity to see his friends.

Clone Gyro was also looking at the picture.

"I don't remember that." He muttered. "Perhaps I, I mean, your friend Gyro wanted to keep some things from the clones? Personal artefacts, such as the time he spent with Bulb? Because I can't seem to recall this trip."

"Yeah." Fenton murmured, unable to take his eyes away from the smiling face in the picture. "Maybe."

Clone Gyro looked towards the smiling pair in the picture.

"Wherever they are." He muttered. "I hope they're together."

"Me too." Fenton said. He looked away from the clone that he now knew wasn't Gyro. McDuck's chief scientist had been replaced. Lil Bulb was gone. So what now?


End file.
